THORNTON

 DEATH BY MARBLE  😢 approaching 4 miles

Be Warned ! by ......... Jim, John, Mike, Anthony.

We parked next to a graveyard which had notices to tell the public this was a GRAVEYARD not  a PARK  We shall see more of this "Cemetery" at the end of our walk. We appeared to be in a very normal suburban estate. This was to change.

Only a short distance along the road before a sturdy kissing gate took us into a small but very attractive piece of woodland.

Where sturdy limbs abounded 😁

                        Sturdy limbs     come to Sturdy limbs   

      Take yer pick

On leaving the wood we found ourselves in Bel Air or Beverly Hills or their North Fylde equivalent.

Seemingly £1 Million + houses surrounded us. Large handsome  houses with large gardens  with flower beds and topiary set against meticulously manicured lawns.

This particular lawn wasn't even within a garden. 

On the drives sat large BMWs, MERCEDEs, JAGUARS and the ubiquitous top of the range LANDROVERS as well as a sprinkling of luxury of Italian sports cars. There were very few Fords , Citroens or Fiats.  

Excuse me Mr Writer......... Do I detect a hint of the "Green Eyed Monster" emerging from your keyboard ?

One such house Mike knew very well. It belonged to his employer when he was a young apprentice. He laid the lawn and fixed many of the power points (Sockets) in the house as it was being built.

As we came to the edge of this bastion of wealth, Mike took us to a spot where, as a child, his parents had taken him on numerous occasions. SWANPOND (?) Today, however, there where no swans but plenty of ducks and some possibly unwelcome "squatters".

Here there were seats so we sat a while as is our wont. Before leaving we spotted the "Squatters" basking in the warm sunlight.

They were "TERRAPINS" probably kept as pets till their owners (with bitten fingers) realised what vicious critters they were and released them into the pond.

Over our heads other foreign visitors were gathering for the Herculean flights back to their winter homes.

They were very high in the sky and my trusty but small camera struggled to  catch them. Look very carefully.

They were almost certainly geese "slipstreaming" to preserve energy. Anthony suggested they were going south for the winter, John was not sure but on checking found that Anthony was correct. WEST AFRICA would be the destination for many.

By now it was lunchtime and even our pottering pace had given us an appetite and the "Linden" Tea Room" had been recommended. It certainly deserved its recommendations with charming staff and generous portions of excellent food.

As we sat in the sun enjoying our lunch in "Linden". A song we learnt in our primary school days came to mind. Nostalgia being one of the (few) pleasures of ageing we indulged our selves with a rendition of "Linden Lea" A song sung by Malcolm Martineau, Bryn Terfel and set to music by Vaughan Williams.  We only remembered one verse ("Thank goodness" I hear you say.....   Philistines ! )

Let other folk make money faster

In the air of darkroomed towns

I don't dread a peevish master

And no man may heed my frowns

Oh I be free to go abroad

Or take again my homeward road

To where for me the apple tree do

Lean down low in Linden Lea

After this pleasant break we resumed our walk through suburbia and Mike could hardly pass his sister's front door without a brief stop and greeting. It was only after we had left that your stupid photographer realised he had NOT captured the meeting.

Appearing over the rooftops was an iconic Thornton  building. 

The WINDMILL. Rather annoyingly shrouded in scaffolding.

As we left the windmill we crossed King George's playing fields where Mike in his youth had displayed his footballing talents to vast crowds of supporters (Three sad looking men and a dog)

Soon, we were back on the edge of Thornton and following the roads back to the car. 

There was however one more site to visit and one LAST  tale to tell.

In the graveyard next to where we had parked was one particularly poignant headstone.  After a short search "sniffer dog"  Jim finds Millie's Grave.

Sometime in the middle of the last Century a young girl called MILLIE had marbles, (As did most of us who were children then). Millie put one of the marbles in her mouth. Somehow it managed to stick in her throat. Tragically it could not be removed quickly enough and Millie died. When she was buried the Marble was embedded in her headstone presumably as a lasting warning to other children not to put marbles or other such foreign objects into their mouths. And there it is to this day.

As we looked at the headstone we turned to see that the nearest tree seemed to have bowed and twisted in a mark of sympathy.

And so in a sombre mood we returned to the car and left for home.

Well done Mike for taking us to your "ancestral" homeland. THORNTON usually passed by on one's way to Cleveleys or Fleetwood but well worth a visit in its own right. A quite different but thoroughly enjoyable walk full of interest.

THE END

JW